


For Love I Would

by orangeCrates



Category: Assassin's Creed
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Ambiguous/Open Ending, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-07
Updated: 2014-12-07
Packaged: 2018-02-28 11:10:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,265
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2730218
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orangeCrates/pseuds/orangeCrates
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Malik was a practical man. He never believed himself as the sort of person who would die for love.</p><p>He doesn't believe it even after meeting Altair, but that is because,belief is no longer needed when you've reached the point when you know something is true.</p>
            </blockquote>





	For Love I Would

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by JJ Lin's absolutely fantastic song 江南 often translated as "River South" even though that is totally wrong because Jiang Nan is the name of an area so really it should just be "Jiang Nan".

Malik had a girlfriend once who had asked him, "Do you believe in soul mates?"

He'd looked down and away from the movie with so many plot holes it's only being (barely) held together by a lead actress who was clearly too good for this script. She was curled up at his side, feet tucked up on the couch, looking up at him with a sweet smile.

"That depends." He said because the movie is a bust in that it wasn't any good, but not bad enough that they could laugh about it. "Do I believe that there is someone we are destined to find and fall in love with? Not really." She pouts and he chuckles before poking her nose. She wrinkles it and pulls back minutely. "Do I believe that you can find someone you feel like you've known forever and who you will want to spend the rest of your life with? Then the answer is yes."

His answer mollifies her somewhat but she's clearly not done.

"But do you believe that there is, somewhere in this world, a person you love so much you cannot live without?"

In retrospect, he realizes, that she probably wanted him to say yes and that, for him, she was that person.

But Malik has always been an honest person and honesty was what she answered her with instead of useless sweet words that, in the end, meant nothing.

"No." He strokes her cheek with the back of his hand, when she frowned, "there are many things people cannot live without: water, food and warmth. Everything else is superfluous."

She leans back, sits so she's facing him instead of craning her neck to look up at him. He is disappointed at the loss of her warm body pressed against his, "But you wouldn't you feel heartbroken if you lost someone you lost?"

"I would." He reaches out to grab the remote and mute the TV. "But not enough to die."

"Not even if it were me?"

"I believe it would make more sense to live and keep your memory alive." Because Malik has always been practical.

His girlfriend had found it cute at first, but eventually it was one of the reasons they broke up.

They had loved each other, but in the most important ways they just didn't click, like two gears that didn't quite fit together and constantly causes a mechanism to stall and make distressing noises.

He hadn't understood it at the time, not the way he understood it later. At the time they only knew it wasn't working, though they were hard pressed to give any particular reasons why.

It was all, "you remember that time when you" and "I know I said I loved that about you, but" and other such small instances that were all symptoms and not causes.

He hadn't understood until he fell head-over-heels in love with Altair.

And Malik had never understood that, either, what people meant when they used that saying. (It had always seemed so _over-dramatic_ like a comedian coming onto stage, slipping on a banana peel with exaggerated motions and then going, "Oops, I slipped!" as if it weren't obvious already.) Oh, but then he'd met Altair and he has never met someone that infuriated him so much and at the same time constantly who made his heart feel like it's trying to beat its way out of the confines of his ribs.

He'd never loved anyone else with such reckless abandon and it would have, _should_ have been frightening, but it wasn't. In fact, he's never felt safer than when Altair held him in his arms and Malik could feel the rise and fall of his chest when he breathed.

He would have found himself ridiculous if Altair didn't randomly crowd into his personal space with no other explanation other than because he wanted to be close, or didn't come home everyday and greet Malik with a kiss followed by an, "I missed you" as if he didn't pester Malik every other hour with a text message.

Kadar makes faces at him every time he reads one.

"You're so gross." He whines, because, apparently even when he rolls his eyes at some of the stupider messages Altair sends he has this _look_. "I can always tell when it's him. It's gross. You're _both_ gross."

But he is happy for him, really and truly. Because he's never once seen his brother so happy. Which is not to say Malik's life had been miserable, but that did not mean Altair hadn't made his life fuller (even if, on occasion, they get into the worst screaming matches over the stupidest things).

He still can live without Altair. This much he still believes, but when they tell them there is only one more spot in the last life boat, he feels his heart sink.

They look at each other, their expression probably mirrored on each other's faces (surprise and disbelief that turns into dread). Malik is embarrassed to admit that Altair finds his bearings first, turns him by his shoulder and presses their foreheads together.

"Go." He says as if that was even a choice Malik was capable of making (it wasn't. Not at all).

"No." The bulky life jackets get in the way when Malik tilts his head to press a desperate kiss to his mouth, it gets in the way of Altair's hand which feels only like a faint pressure through the thickness of the yellow rubber filled with air that was meant to save their life. He keeps his hand on Altair's face and nothing on Earth could have made him let go.

He would have asked Altair to go if he didn't already prove he wouldn't when he (foolishly) tried to offer his spot to Malik, so he doesn't.

"No." He repeats, instead, when they break for air, and pushes them back and away from the line, letting the next man through.

"Malik..." He says, a frown on his face even as Malik's hand move back to tangle in his hair and pushes forward again to kiss him.

"Not without you." He says and both of Altair's hand are on his hips, keeping him close.

They stand like that as the life boat leaves, as people fall to pray or cry. The night air was bitingly cold. There's fear there, but also a strange sort of peace. They may not die, there is still hope. Even if it turns out to be false, even if they die, Malik wouldn't regret it.

He remembers his girlfriend and that discussion they had on the couch and he still isn't sure he believes in soul mates and he is certain he could live even if Altair were gone, but he cannot bear thinking about it.

"Did you know sea otters hold hands when they sleep?"

The comment was so random that Malik couldn't help raising a brow. It was so ridiculous that it caused a huff of laughter to escape from his mouth and coaxed an answering smile from Altair.

"Yes. Someone I dated once showed me a video of it."

"But do you know _why_?" Because Altair was a collector of random, strange trivia that Malik never entirely understood but found endearing.

"Tell me."

His hand drifts to Malik's hand, settling his own palm settling against his.

"They hold hands so that they won't drift away and wake up to find themselves alone."

He laces their fingers together, a request to not let him go, and feels Malik squeeze back, a promise that he won't.

**Author's Note:**

> They survive. I DON'T CARE IF IT DOESN'T WORK WITH THE SONG. I have written one story based on this song broken my own heart. I've done my time. Altair and Malik get rescued and then they go home, get married and Kadar complains about their excessive PDA in the house after hugging the shit out of his brother when they come back alive. D:


End file.
